1. well well well

2. Ronald Reagan wanted a 600 ship Navy to intimidate the Russkies.

That's why the ranks were so bloated in the eighties. The drawdown after that was a consequence of several factors; the reductions in force that followed the Berlin Wall coming down, along with advances in technology (which eventually evolved in later years into the whole "SMART SHIPS" paradigm--requiring fewer sailors to crew a vessel) and then there were some deep and wide cuts across the board at shore-based commands, as well. Chains of command were streamlined, functions consolidated, a lot of redundant stovepiping of personnel assets was eliminated--it was quite the retooling over the course of fifteen or so years. It was a painful process for many.

AND THEN...in came Dumbya and his wars.

Since there's a limited number, mandated by Congress, of personnel who can serve on active duty, and the USA and USMC had a greater role in Dumbya's wars, the Robbing Peter to Pay Paul commenced. The Navy and Air Force sacrificed (well, they kicked, screamed and did what DOD told them to do) their assets so that Army and USMC could plus-up theirs. The Navy had to do more with less, so they continued to seek out efficiencies, banish redundant and unnecessary work to centralized assets or, better still, eliminate them entirely, and bada-bing!-- they're down to fighting weight in a big way.

Of course, rMoney can't find his way from Iran to Syria, so I doubt he'd understand the reasons behind Naval personnel fluctuations over the last thirty or so years!

4. Also:

"During World War II the United States built 1,000 ships per year with 1,000 people employed in the Bureau of Ships, as the purchasing department of the Department of the Navy was then called. By the 1980s, we were building seventeen ships per year, with 4,000 people in purchasing. Today, when we are building only nine ships a year, the Pentagon manages the shipbuilding process with some 25,000 people." - Mitt